Monday, April 9, 2012

Jindo - Sea parting

This past weekend was Easter weekend. On Friday I went to a Good Friday service at church and we watched some videos and sang some songs. It was very quiet and meditative. After that I met up with Dallas and we watched the Hunger Games with Mike and Britney. On our way to the theater, we stopped in a store downtown and Dallas bought a shirt. He also changed clothes in the middle of the store. He somehow left his phone there, which we didn't find out until after the movie at midnight - when the store was closed. We also had to leave early the next day, so Mike ended up going to the store for him and finding the phone.

On Saturday morning we got up and met up with people at church to ride a bus to Jindo for the sea parting festival. Once a year in Jindo in Jeollanam-do Province, the seas part and you can walk to a nearby island. It's due to the difference in high and low tides and you end up with about a 50m wide "road" that's about 2.8km long. Not sure if it happens Easter weekend every year, but it seemed to fit in with the theme.

The festival itself was kind of lame. The food wasn't very good (although Dallas loved these chicken things) and there wasn't a lot to do in terms of activities. But it was a beautiful day and we were at the beach. There were about 30 people in the group, but we sectioned off very quickly and Dallas and I stayed by ourselves most of the day.

Parade thing - these guys played for like 4 hours

Dallas eating chicken

We got there 4 hours before the sea parting, so the beach started off pretty empty

Dallas likes to take random pictures. Sometimes they come out decent.

Climbing on rocks. He also likes to pose, which is fun for me because he will do some ridiculous things.

We took lots of pictures on the rocks, walked around, then climbed up to the top of a hill and I napped/laid on a bench while he read the second book of the Hunger Games series. From the top we could see the sea starting to part. We stayed there for a bit, then went back down to the bottom, where we met up with some more people.

Sea beginning to part at the opposite side

The middle opening up

Then we ended up separating again for the actual walk in the sea. It was really cool and an experience I won't forget. The water was pretty cold, but not the coldest I've been in, and it was slippery, but I didn't fall. There were random crabs, starfish and lots of people picking up clams and seaweed.

The line in the background is the first set of people crossing. There were hundreds of people, but honestly it didn't feel that crowded except when we walked down the stairs to the beach.

Our friend Hein dressed up as Moses (he wasn't the only one).

me on the water's edge

Holding a starfish. They were all this grey color with bright orange spots.

Sunset on our way back right before the tides came back in

The tides came in super fast. There was a boat warning people to come back. The also were selling those big boots, but I was fine in flip flops.

Group shot right before we rode the bus home

The bus ride home was long and I slept for a little bit then talked to Dallas when he finished the book. I went home and slept for 10 hours straight without moving.

Sunday morning I got up and met Dallas and Anna at church. There was a good sermon, one lady made peanut butter eggs and then we went to lunch. After lunch we went shopping at E-mart then Homeplus because Dallas was trying to find plastic eggs for his class. No luck on that. Then we went to dinner and home. Sounds like a lot of eating, but it really wasn't. It was more talking and walking around. It was a long day/weekend, but a lot of fun.